These two records are vivid, exhilarating examples of how Americans can use New Wave punk music for their own purposes. Both Pere Ubu and the Suicide Commandos are from the Midwest (Cleveland and Minneapolis, respectively), and The Modern Dance and Make a Record are the first two releases on Blank, an intelligently subversive subsidiary of Mercury.

Pere Ubu's The Modern Dance is harsh and willfully ugly, yet always mindful of certain rock & roll imperatives: a solid beat, snappy lyrics and engaging themes. Ubu tends to break these imperatives apart: if the lyrics are funny, the melody will be excruciatingly abstract; if the melody is catchy, the lyrics will be intentionally dull or indecipherable. But David Thomas' smooth, adenoidal vocals and Tom Herman's staccato guitar playing provide the musical glue to hold everything together.

The band's name, derived from a character in turn-of-the-century avant-gardist Alfred Jarry's famous plays, has some significance. As in the work of Jarry and other Dadaists, there is, beneath Pere Ubu's shouted cynicism, a painfully hopeful romanticism, a feeling that if you wallow in ugliness with a sufficiently noble and artistic intent, the ugliness will become attractive. It did for Jarry, and it does for Pere Ubu, especially on the title song—a swirling, complex collage—and on the sardonic but hearty "Humor Me."

The Suicide Commandos are less studiously outré and more than willing to be catchy. These three Minnesotans maintain an intellectually brilliant but emotionally naive image of themselves, and the frustration that arises from such a combination results in a lot of good thrashing. Again and again during Make a Record's fifteen songs, guitarist Chris Osgood and bassist Steve Almaas shoot out quick raveups that make their points and scram. Dave Ahl's drumming is layered and spongy, but as anxious as the band's psyche.

A recurrent theme is the group's questionable compatibility with the Rest of the World ("I Don't Get It," "Semi-Smart"), a theme that branches off into smaller obsessions ("Mosquito Crucifixion") or odes to their chosen form ("Attacking the Beat," "Burn It Down"). While they tend toward the disjointed tempos of Talking Heads and Television, the Commandos also have a lot of nerve of their own, as shown by the guitar swell in the center of "You Can't," the clean crunch of "Mr. Dr." and the entire album's high level of wit and roughneck grace.

The Suicide Commandos see themselves as beleaguered outsiders (wouldn't you if you were a three-man punk band in Minneapolis?), but their modest self-consciousness is charming. These guys are a band to love. (RS 266)

KEN TUCKER